When Cava Takes Over… Sept. 30, 2023
I couldn’t even wait to begin writing this blog until the actual wine & cheese tasting happened.
I heard last Saturday from my shop’s lead monger that all the wines this upcoming Saturday, October 1, would be sparkling. I loveeeeee sparkling wines. Bubbles are so incredibly festive and bright, not to mention delicious. Whenever bubbles are present, you have an instant celebration, even if life itself is the occasion.
Not only are sparkling wines a lot of fun on their own or paired, they complement practically any cheese! Now of course, not every single sparkling wine pairs with every single cheese. Of course it depends on acidic versus sweet (pardon me, Brut Nature versus Doux / Demi Sec). But you can always count on bubbles to cut through the intense creaminess and/or fattiness of fresh and young goat cheeses, triple cremes, aged goudas, so oh so many more.
Upon arriving at work in the morning, I learned that all four sparkling wines were going to be Cava’s. Cava is a region in Spain, where they produce Designation of Origin (meaning that no other regions or countries in the European Union are permitted to produce a wine outside of the Cava region and call it “Cava”) wines. For a quick primer, my shop’s wine manager explained to me that Cava is very similar to Champagne because it’s produced in the same way, because they both have similar sugar levels, and because of the signature yeasty, bread-like note in the bouquet typical of Champagne.
Let’s explore the pairings that my shop featured on September 30.
Casa Dora Cava Brut - Penedes, Spain | Paired with Goat Camembert (R & G Cheese Makers, Troy, New York)
Roger Goulart Organic Cava Brut Reserva 2018 - Catalonia, Spain | Paired with Fermier Camembert (Ferme de la Tremblaye, La Boissière-École, France)
Oriol Rossell Cava Brut Rosado - Catalonia, Spain | Paired with Piave Riserva (Formaggio Piave DOP, Belluno, Italy)
Oriol Rossell Cava Brut Nature Reserva 2018 - Catalonia, Spain | Paired with Grana Padano, Grana Padano Consortium, various regions, Italy)
Let’s begin with our Casa Dora Cava Brut. This bright sparkler was a crowd favorite, capturing 60% of the total sales I did of the four wines at the tasting table! On the nose, it gave juicy, ripe, practically bursting ripe peach, with other notes of white fruit and bright stone fruit. The taste was light and mild, and it was so easily drinkable I could have easily drank an entire bottle without even realizing it! Plus, out of the four wines it was the most amenable, and could have easily been mixed with Aperol for cocktails, or with your favorite juice for mimosas. We paired this Cava with R & G Cheese Makers Goat Camembert, and the rich, dense yet moist cheese went down perfectly with this pairing. I really appreciated the beautiful creamline and paste separation in the Goat Camembert, and detected just a little bit of pepper on the finish for this cheese in the most pleasing way. I would definitely pick up some of this cheese for myself, and I really appreciate that everything from R & G Cheese Makers is handcrafted and uses milk that’s sourced from nearby farms in the Hudson, Mohawk and Hoosick Valleys of New York.
Moving on to our second Cava, the Organic Cava Brut Reserva 2018 gave a similar bouquet as the first wine, but with a very distinct overtone of apple thrown in with the peaches and white fruit. On the nose we also got the classic bread-proofing-before-being-baked note, which is characteristic of fine Champagnes and noteworthy of Cava’s as well. This sparkling wine had a light body as well, but the apple and peach gave it a fruit-forward impression, and the acidity with it was very well balanced. It had a pleasant roundness to it, if I do say so myself. We paired this wine with Fermier Camembert, a barnyard-chic camembert with a pungent rind almost reminiscent of something from Jasper Hill, with very vegetal, specifically (at least for me!) Brussels Sprouts notes being unstoppably present. I also got notes of animalistic pasture floor on a muddy day! Though not exactly my favorite, plenty of customers loved this cheese, and it was actually the cheese we sold most of during the day. In my opinion, I was glad to have a delightful glass of bubbles to wash it down!
Third on our pairing list was Cava Brut Rosado, a sparkling Rosé Cava made from 60% Grenache and 40% Pinot Noir. This beauty gave tart raspberry on the nose, with some unripened stone fruit and a slight breadiness in the bouquet. The taste was light, with dimensions of red fruit and some acidity, leading to a dry finish that complemented our paired cheese perfectly. We went with Piave Riserva to partner, and the dry finish of the piave went very nicely with that of the rosé. The Piave Riserva had the texture of a 2+ year aged Gouda, with that fudgey density and spectacular chewiness that lingers in your mouth. Whenever you have a dense cheese, it’s always nice to have a sparkling wine or any carbonated beverage to pair it with, because they’ll both go down nicely with one another. Several customers also noted that it gave a slight nutty flavor, and I have to agree!
And finally, we tasted Cava Brut Nature Reserva 2018. The bouquet gave very little to work with as far as I could tell, I could feel myself inhaling with actual gusto trying to come up with bouquet notes! After intense investigation, I determined that the bouquet gave very little citrus, and a little bit of the yeast-like breadiness. The taste was far more interesting, giving an overall creaminess that I didn’t know was possible in sparkling wines. It was still brut (i.e. off-dry) but it gave very little acidity and it was almost as if a chardonnay was magically carbonated. Super cool & interesting, in my opinion. Though, it was my least favorite of the four, so take my notes with a grain of salt! We paired this with a 12-month Grana Padano, which I personally like to refer to as Parmigiano Reggiano’s buttery little sister. She’s easygoing yet uncompromising, amenable yet independent. I love a Grana Padano quite honestly, and would much rather snack on G.P. than P.R. (don’t hate!). Either way, the buttery, mellow notes of Grana Padano were complemented perfectly by the creamy tones in our final wine.
I learned a lot of new things about Cava during this tasting, and hope you did too!
